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The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

bou.ke

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Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#11

Post by stevefan1999 »

...and is probably one of the least libre* computer I've seen in the 21th century, too.

Before that, Linux can't run on MacBooks, and after a few years of development it's just barely working, now this thing.

This is never going to be Desktop Linux compatible. Even Linus claimed he would like to but the effort is tremendous.

>>>

I'd absolutely love to have one, if it just ran Linux.. I have fairly fond memories of the 11" Macbook Air (I think 4,1) that I used about a decade ago (but moved away from because it took Apple too long to fix the screen - and by the time they did, I'd moved on to better laptops, and Apple had moved on to make Linux less convenient).

Apple may run Linux in their cloud, but their laptops don't ;(

I've been waiting for an ARM laptop that can run Linux for a long time. The new Air would be almost perfect, except for the OS. And I don't have the time to tinker with it, or the inclination to fight companies that don't want to help.

Linus

>>>

Maybe you can run just some more productivity apps by sacrificing your freedom to be kept captive by Apple. But this also means your machine isn't entirely yours.

*: used liberal here. I don't know what's the exactly word to use but it turns out there are people so sensitive to politics and thought the otherwise.

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#12

Post by xirbeosbwo1234 »

New computer is better than old computer. Shocking.

The M1 is a good chip. It is great that we have ARM cores that can go toe-to-toe with Zen 3. It is hardly a revolution and it would not be trivial to scale it to a workstation or server design.

It is telling to see someone acting like the competition is still Intel. Intel has been playing catchup since Q1 of 2017. Their server parts in particular are woefully outdated.

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#13

Post by nicbou »

systemvoltage wrote: post #9

Except the interface which has been designed for touch interfaces without having any touch capability on the Mac, for the sake of "design unity" bullshit. You can't have M1 without macOS Big Sur. Not only on macOS, but generally the entire web is mobile-first and desktop-last philosophy.

I like Big Sur. Everything works just as well with the mouse as before. They made many quality of life improvements to the touch bar, and didn't mess with the other things.

What exactly was made worse by it?

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#15

Post by systemvoltage »

nicbou wrote: post #13
systemvoltage wrote: post #9

Except the interface which has been designed for touch interfaces without having any touch capability on the Mac, for the sake of "design unity" bullshit. You can't have M1 without macOS Big Sur. Not only on macOS, but generally the entire web is mobile-first and desktop-last philosophy.

I like Big Sur. Everything works just as well with the mouse as before. They made many quality of life improvements to the touch bar, and didn't mess with the other things. What exactly was made worse by it?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25072644

Instead of repeating same things over, there has been plenty of discussion on HN about macOS big sur design changes.

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#16

Post by harperlee »

messe wrote: post #6
amelius wrote: post #2

"owned"

Yep, a machine owned by the user. They're free to install whatever software they want on it, including the OS. Now, it happens that Linux and other free OSes don't support the hardware yet, but that doesn't diminish the fact that they can be ported. Is there a particular point you'd like to make?

I can make the point that those “ownership” quotes would very well apply to iphone and ipad, based on your OS installability criterium.

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#17

Post by paddim8 »

stevefan1999 wrote: post #11

...and is probably one of the least libre* computer I've seen in the 21th century, too. Before that, Linux can't run on MacBooks, and after a few years of development it's just barely working, now this thing. This is never going to be Desktop Linux compatible. Even Linus claimed he would like to but the effort is tremendous. >>> I'd absolutely love to have one, if it just ran Linux.. I have fairly fond memories of th…

Actually, Linux might actually run quite well on it soon. https://asahilinux.org/

Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned

#20

Post by messe »

harperlee wrote: post #16
messe wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, a machine owned by the user. They're free to install whatever software they want on it, including the OS. Now, it happens that Linux and other free OSes don't support the hardware yet, but that doesn't diminish the fact that they can be ported. Is there a particular point you'd like to make?

I can make the point that those “ownership” quotes would very well apply to iphone and ipad, based on your OS installability criterium.

Other than the fact that those require a jailbreak to do so, and are far more locked down than the M1 Macs because of that.
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